CFP: Pluralism: Addressing the Challenges of the Modern Nation-State

Theme: Pluralism
Subtitle: Addressing the Challenges of the Modern Nation-State
Type: 10th Global Meeting
Institution: Inter-Disciplinary.Net
Location: Dubrovnik (Croatia)
Date: 2.–4.5.2015

Deadline: 23.1.2015

Pluralism is both a challenge as well as a goal of communities in the
contemporary modern Nation-States.
Communities are grappling with issues like ISIS, the
near-independence of Scotland, ongoing viability of the EU, Russia
vs. Ukraine vs. international community and asylum-seekers policy,
just to name a few. At the same time, there is increased
diversification of population with large-scale migrations, and
diversity of populations in modern Nation-States is celebrated.
Modern communities are grappling with a number of core issues. They
include:
(a) dealing with curtailment of individual freedoms amid fears of
attack;
(b) striking a balance between ‘secrecy’, police and state
surveillance, individual privacy, post wiki-leaks in a strong
cyber-link scenario;
(c) planning cities and spaces and addressing ghettoization of urban
communities in quarters where tourists visit (such as tourists
visiting ‘Arab quarter’ in Paris, the ‘Jewish quarter’ in London; and
(d) evaluating the impact and influence of ethnic groups on local
economies, shop traders, etc.
Pluralism in the contemporary Nation-State scenario is increasingly
coming under scrutiny. The Nation-State requires new modes of thought
and analysis, as global trends in population, capital flows, cultural
exchanges, cyber links and the like enmesh with post-national forces,
challenging the stability of the Nation-State and its permanence as
the basic socio-political construct.
Pluralism as the contextual framework for rational thinking has
allowed for and created a vision that there are pluralities of
diverse facts and passage of time amongst other things, for the
consolidation of these processes that permeates throughout the
diaspora. This vision, though, can sometimes easily allow for,
instances of pure speculations. Facts are influenced strongly by
contexts. As context brings real knowledge to existing data, the
objectivity of the data is questioned by some.

The Pluralism Project, thus far, has embodied the ontology of
knowledge creation from all groupings acknowledging that there is
subjectivity in creating objectivity. The focus of the project has
been to create a platform for an international, interdisciplinary
exchange of ideas to explore awareness of the responses to such
paradigmatic and institutional policies and processes in advancing
counter positions that translate into pluralism.
The project has moved its focus to the realities of paradigm
consolidation in general and the imbalances of power in reality.

The 10th Global Conference on Pluralism will build on the previous
conferences. ‘Pluralism: Addressing the challenges of the modern
Nation-State’ summarizes the way the project has developed over
previous years and they have acknowledged that facts are usually
contested and contexts are value loaded.

Keeping with these observations, this year’s event will mainly focus
on finding new and hitherto established ways to examine:
- The impact of transnationalism and post-nationalism on pluralism
  and conversely, its impact upon transnationalism and
  post-nationalism
- Mapping the development of the nation-state and its effect on
  pluralism
- Assessing the relationship between pluralism and national identity
- Exploring modes of development of pluralism in civil society
- The role of digital media as platform where issues of pluralism,
  dual citizenship, and transnational movements are debated and
  sustained
- The ontology of the nation-state; the ontology of modernity: are
  they compatible with pluralism?
- Agency in the pluralism process: is it a requirement for
  citizenship?
- The post-secular and pluralism
- Corporate interventions on pluralism and inclusion
- Demographic shifts and new pluralisms
- Beyond the nation-state: the future of pluralism
- The impact of Cultural Pluralism on human development and the
  mobility transition: brain drain, brain gain, and brain circulation
- Relationship between liberalism and pluralism
- Pluralism, identity and violence
- Religious identity and pluralism
- Difference, Recognition and pluralism
- The idea of clash of civilizations as a paradigm to “understand”
  the modern world predicament
- Model of universal dignity and pluralism

The Steering Group welcomes the submission of proposals for short
workshops, practitioner-based activities, best practice showcases,
how-to sessions, live demonstrations, performances, and pre-formed
panels. We particularly welcome short film screenings; photographic
essays; installations; interactive talks and alternative presentation
styles that encourage engagement.

What to Send:
300 word proposals should be submitted by Friday 23rd January 2015.
All submissions are at least double blind peer reviewed. Proposals
should be submitted simultaneously to the Organising Chairs;
abstracts may be in Word or RTF formats with the following
information and in this order:

a) author(s), b) affiliation, c) email address, d) title of abstract,
e) body of abstract E-mails should be titled: Pluralism 10 Proposal
Submission

Please use plain text (Times Roman 12) and abstain from using
footnotes and any special formatting, characters or emphasis (such as
bold, italics or underline). We acknowledge receipt and answer to all
paper proposals submitted. If you do not receive a reply from us in a
week you should assume we did not receive your proposal; it might be
lost in cyberspace! We suggest, then, to look for an alternative
electronic route or resend.

Joint Organising Chairs:
Ram Vemuri & Rob Fisher: [email protected]

The conference is part of the ‘Diversity and Recognition’ research
projects, which in turn belong to the ‘At the Interface’ programmes
of Inter-Disciplinary.Net. It aims to bring together people from
different areas and interests to share ideas and explore discussions
which are innovative and challenging. All papers accepted for and
presented at the conference must be in English and will be eligible
for publication in an ISBN eBook. Selected papers may be developed
for publication in a themed hard copy volume(s). All publications
from the conference will require editors, to be chosen from
interested delegates from the conference.

Inter-Disciplinary.Net believes it is a mark of personal courtesy and
professional respect to your colleagues that all delegates should
attend for the full duration of the meeting. If you are unable to
make this commitment, please do not submit an abstract for
presentation.

For further details of the conference, please visit:
http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/at-the-interface/diversity-recognition/pluralism-inclusion-and-citizenship/call-for-papers/


Contact:

Dr. Rob Fisher
Priory House
149B Wroslyn Road
Freeland, Oxfordshire OX29 8HR
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0)1993 882087
Fax: +44 (0)870 4601132
Email: [email protected]
Web